LINK: FICTION AND NON-FICTION DESCRIPTIONS AND ORDERING INFO

Thursday, November 13, 2014

Bone up on your Puccini in this Italian Crime Romp!: New Review for Murder in Hand (Alicia Allen Investigates Book 3)...

My especial thanks to Marlan Warren for her detailed review of Murder in Hand which was first published on the Open Salon blog on 12 November 2014entitled: “Murder in Hand”: Italian Probate, Puccini & Dead Lawyers (see below).

It's always a joy when a reader tells you that he/she enjoyed reading one of your books.

With my non-fiction legal handbooks I am pleased when a reader tells me that the book has helped because that is what the book is designed to do. With fiction it really is
subjective and so it is a delight to receive a great review.

Accordingly, I'm very pleased to have received this comprehensive review of "Murder in Hand" from Marlan Warren:

“Murder in Hand”: Italian Probate, Puccini & Dead Lawyers

Lawyers aren’t the most popular people, Miss Allen…”

—Murder in Hand

In her cerebral legal mystery, Murder in Hand,
Celia Conrad pulls her feisty London Probate/Estate lawyer heroine,
Alicia Allen, deeper into the quagmire world of unscrupulous attorneys,
the unfortunates who work with them and their unsuspecting innocent
victims. In this third book of the Alicia Allen Investigates Trilogy (AAI), Conrad
hits her stride as a bona fide puzzle master in the tradition of Agatha
Christie. The easy-to-follow plot line keeps readers guessing and the
pages turning, while great pleasures lie in Conrad’s refusal–or perhaps
inability–to write for the lowest common denominator of brain power.
Instead she aims for the highest.

If you want to roll with Alicia Allen…better bring your A-Game (and some knowledge of the Classics wouldn’t hurt).

Murder in Hand could be enjoyed as a stand-alone
book if readers don’t mind not knowing the history between the
justice-loving attorney Alicia Allen and her adoring cohort Alex
Waterford; her investigator friends, Jo and Will; or her cultured
elderly neighbor Dorothy.
The story takes off when Alicia’s Italian American client Fabio
confides that he believes someone is trying to kill him. Fabio’s family
ties span New York, England and Italy/Sicily; and when his sister is
killed in the midst of doing some family estate research in Italy,
Alicia embarks on a quest to find the killer.

“I can’t leave you alone for a few hours without somebody else being murdered.”—Murder in Hand

As in Books 1 and 2 (A Model Murder and Wilful Murder),
Alicia leaps where proverbial angels fear to tread, resisting Alex’s
concerns for her safety. and soon he is helping her sort the puzzle
pieces as the body count goes up (with the neat twist that as they hone
in, it is lawyers or their assistants who are now dropping dead).
Their relationship has matured into an easy partnership built on love,
trust and the potato chip that rhymes with “Tingles.” It provides a
soothing stability that contrasts with the dark, random world of mayhem
they are navigating together.

“I generally advise my clients to make both a British and an Italian Will.“—Murder in Hand

All the AAI books turn on classical theater or
operatic references or clues. Murder in Hand pays homage to Gianni
Schicchi (which Puccini based on Danté’s Divine Comedy), a comic opera
about a dead man’s Will gone wrong, schemers and estate swindlers. And
it won’t be spoiling too much to divulge that key action takes place in
the Italian town that hosts an annual Puccini festival.
The book’s title is a double entendre. British police refer to an
investigation in progress as “in hand.” And as for the other
meaning…well, you’ll just have to read the book, won’t you?
(Hint: Bone up on your Puccini!)
============================================